The San Francisco 49ers lost a brutal game to the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday. Not only did they lose the game, they also lost some key players due to injury.
This includes their kicker, Jake Moody, who suffered a high-ankle sprain.
With Moody likely to miss at least several weeks, the Niners should try to bring legendary kicker and former 49er Robbie Gould out of retirement.
Special teams have been a weakness for the 49ers all year. It looked like maybe they were starting to turn things around on special teams when defensive tackle Jordan Elliott blocked a field-goal attempt by the Cardinals, and cornerback Deomodore Lenoir recovered the ball and took it to the house for a touchdown.
The special teams’ success was short-lived, though, because shortly thereafter, the Niners let the Cardinals get a big kickoff return, which forced kicker Jake Moody to make a tackle. His ankle got twisted awkwardly on the play, and he was diagnosed with a high-ankle sprain on his kicking foot.
Head coach Kyle Shanahan said after the game that the team will have to act quickly to work out several kickers on a short week with the Niners set to face the Seattle Seahawks on Thursday night. Shanahan is anticipating Moody to be out for several weeks, so this is not just a brief one-week fill-in.
If you look at the current list of available free-agent kickers, it is not an impressive list. It consists of Brandon McManus who has been accused of sexual assault, Randy Bullock who is a journeyman kicker, and Riley Patterson who is a younger kicker who has bounced around the past few years. There may be others out there, but there is no one that stands out.
That is why the Niners should seriously consider bringing in Gould.
Gould had six solid seasons for San Francisco and made several memorable kicks, the most meaningful being the game-winner he kicked against the Green Bay Packers in the snow back during the 2021 playoffs.
The Niners drafted Moody to replace Gould, and things did not end on the best of terms between him and San Francisco.
However, with these next few games being extremely important for the 49ers, they need to make sure they have the best kicker possible for games that could potentially be very close and may come down to a field goal.
We do not know if Gould has stayed in shape or if he has kept kicking in retirement. It seems unlikely that he would be ready to go by Thursday. But if whoever the Niners get to replace Moody struggles against the Seahawks, it would not hurt for the Niners to bring Gould in to see if he still has that magic leg.
The Niners stand at 2-3. Their poor start to the year means they have little room for error the rest of the season. They need to have the best kicker possible while Moody is on the mend, which is why they need to give Gould a call.
